Ingredient Weight Converter · flour
Cornmeal: cups to grams
1 cup of cornmeal weighs 165 grams. Use the converter below for any other amount, or check the quick-reference table.
By Andrew Flores, Editor and publisher, Nathan Management. Last reviewed .
Density source: USDA FoodData Central, cross-checked against the King Arthur Baking weight chart. How these figures are derived and corrected is documented in our editorial standards.
Cornmeal baseline: 1 cup = 165 g.
Common amounts
| Cups | Tablespoons | Grams | Ounces (weight) | Milliliters |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1/4 cup | 4.0 | 41 g | 1.46 oz | 59 mL |
| 1/3 cup | 5.3 | 55 g | 1.94 oz | 79 mL |
| 1/2 cup | 8.0 | 83 g | 2.91 oz | 118 mL |
| 2/3 cup | 10.7 | 110 g | 3.88 oz | 158 mL |
| 3/4 cup | 12.0 | 124 g | 4.37 oz | 177 mL |
| 1 cup | 16.0 | 165 g | 5.82 oz | 237 mL |
| 1.5 cups | 24.0 | 248 g | 8.73 oz | 355 mL |
| 2 cups | 32.0 | 330 g | 11.64 oz | 473 mL |
| 3 cups | 48.0 | 495 g | 17.46 oz | 710 mL |
| 4 cups | 64.0 | 660 g | 23.28 oz | 946 mL |
Spoon weights
Derived from the same 165 g per cup — a US tablespoon is 1/16 of a cup and a teaspoon is 1/48.
| Amount | Grams |
|---|---|
| 1 tablespoon | 10 g |
| 1 teaspoon | 3.4 g |
| 1/2 teaspoon | 1.7 g |
| 1/4 teaspoon | 0.86 g |
Cornmeal at a glance
- Grind matters more than color
- Yellow and white cornmeal bake the same; fine vs. coarse changes both weight and texture
- Degerminated vs. stone-ground
- Degerminated keeps a year; stone-ground keeps the oily germ and goes rancid in a few months
- Polenta
- Italian polenta is coarse-ground cornmeal — the same product under a different name
What a cup of cornmeal actually weighs
The published 165 g assumes one specific way of filling the cup. Here is what the same cup weighs under the other common handling methods and product forms, and how far off the recipe you end up.
| How it was measured | Grams per cup | vs. published | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fine grind, spooned | ~170 g | +3% | Small particles fill the gaps between each other, so a cup holds more actual corn. |
| Medium grind, spooned | 165 g | published figure | The published figure and the default in most US cornbread recipes. |
| Coarse stone-ground, spooned | ~150 g | -9% | Big irregular particles leave big air gaps, so the same cup holds less. |
A tilde (~) marks a working estimate rather than a published figure — it varies with brand, grind, or how hard the cup was packed.
Why measuring cornmeal by cup goes wrong
Cornmeal comes in fine, medium, and coarse grinds, and stone-ground varieties keep the germ for more flavor and a shorter shelf life. A cup of medium-grind yellow cornmeal weighs about 165 grams. Finely ground masa harina is different — it's nixtamalized, meaning the corn was cooked in an alkaline solution — and is not interchangeable.
Practical tips for working with cornmeal
Soak coarse cornmeal in buttermilk or milk for 10 minutes before adding it to a cornbread batter. The soak softens the grit so the finished bread doesn't crunch like sand. For polenta, the same trick works: cold-soaking the cornmeal in its liquid for 30 minutes before cooking cuts the total simmer time in half and produces a creamier final dish.
Note from this ingredient's record: Stone-ground varieties are coarser and slightly heavier. For cornbread, swap fine cornmeal cup-for-cup but increase liquid by about 1 tablespoon if you go coarser.
Substitutions that work — and what they cost you
Polenta for coarse cornmeal
Ratio: 1:1
Trade-off: Same product. 'Instant polenta' is pre-cooked and is not the same — it will turn to paste in a cornbread.
Masa harina for cornmeal
Ratio: No clean swap exists
Trade-off: Masa is nixtamalized corn: different flavor, different water uptake, and it binds into a dough. Use it for tortillas and tamales, not cornbread.
When cornmeal ruins the recipe
| What you see | What went wrong | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Cornbread crunches like sand | Coarse meal that never hydrated in a fast-mixed batter. | Soak the meal in the recipe's buttermilk for 10–20 minutes before mixing the rest. |
| Cornmeal smells sour or musty | Stone-ground meal has gone rancid — the germ oil oxidized. | Throw it out; the off flavor bakes straight through. Store stone-ground meal in the freezer. |
Storing cornmeal
Degerminated cornmeal keeps about a year sealed at room temperature. Stone-ground belongs in the refrigerator or freezer, where it keeps six months or more.
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